Pauker was born in Hungary, and moved to the US in 1924. He worked for the US government beginning in World War II. Over his lifetime, he worked for the Office of War Information, Voice of America Radio, as a White House speechwriter, for the US Embassy in India, and the US Information Agency, where he retired as chief policy guidance officer.

Pauker was the author of fourteen books and editor of the journal Furioso, which he co-founded with Reed Whittemore and Jim Angleton. Four books of his poems were published in the US: Yoked by Violence (1949), Excellence (1968), Angry Candy (1976), and In Solitary and Other Imaginations (1977). He also published books in Iran, India, and France, and wrote fiction, criticism, plays (including one produced on Broadway, called Moonbirds), and translated literature from many languages.

Pauker, who lost many relatives in the Holocaust, sponsored a number of writers and intellectuals to the US, saving their lives, including Solomon Deressa from Ethiopia, and Arnost Lustig of Czechoslovakia. He regularly hosted evenings of international writers in his home, and helped exiles find teaching positions.